Sealions return

Hello all, I realise that it has been a little while since I last wrote in the daily log. Things have been busy. Ocean Educations, a three week summer diving program at Pearson College just finished this week and I’ve been busy with that, as well as keeping a German film crew of four from German public TV busy -you may have noticed Tom, Christian, Florian and Michael on the Island this week). They were busy shooting two documentaries at Race Rocks. They left this morning and I’m pleased to say that they acquired some stunning footage, above and below the water, during their stay. Things have quieted down a bit now though, so I hope to be a bit more regular in my entries for these last few weeks of my stationing at Race. Many of you will be pleased to hear that camera 5 has been repaired. Apparently there was a problem in the electrical board inside. I have it on the Island and am planning on re-installing on its mount tomorrow. If all goes to plan, it should be up and running by tomorrow afternoon. Over the last week or so, the sea lions have made quite a return. I ‘d estimate that there are probably around 100 individuals in the Reserve right now, with an equal split between northern sea lions and California sea lions. Their numbers will continue to grow as the summer draws slowly to a close. Slash is still hauled up on Great Race these days, as always. I’ve not seen Misery for a while now, although it ”s possible he’s out on Middle Rock as I saw a couple of elephant seals out there a few days ago. I suspect that Misery got a bit sick of Slash and decided to seek out some peace and quiet. There was also a mature female here for a few days late last week and early this week, but she has since left. The gull chicks are now getting quite large. Many have started to fledge and are beginning to ”test their wings ”. I ‘ve not seen any in the air yet, although I ”ve seen many flapping their limbs energetically as they try to see how their wings work! This week I also found quite a large number of dead and/or injured chicks. I think they are often attacked by other adults from outside their territory. There is actually a chick right outside my basement door that has been there for four days now; my best guess is that it wandered or ran off far from the nest then couldn ‘t find its way back. On the third day -yesterday), I woke up to find it with a broken wing. It ”s quite sad to see it huddling in the damp grass with a broken wing, while a couple of metres away, a mother feeds her three healthy chicks. Quite a stark division. I expect this chick will soon die from starvation or predation. I saw the otter several times this week. I haven ”t seen as many eagles around this week as I have in previous weeks. I ”ll keep you updated to this poor little gull over the next few days. That ”s all for now. Adam’, ’21:20:54 ,